A pet peeve of mine is the phrase reading for meaning. It’s a nonsense idea. When we speak of reading, the meaning part should be implied because reading without meaning isn’t really reading at all. We should call that, moving your eyes across a page. Or zoning out with eyes open. Or zombie zigzagging. Or just something else.
Here’s an example of a made up headline: “50% of grade 8 pupils cannot read for meaning.” Although the percentages might be higher for grade 8 students in South Africa, this is not too far from something that you might encounter in reality.
But the phrase is deceptive.
I would argue that we need to be more precise. We can, for instance, classify comprehension into a category of low, moderate or high. Just an idea. But if a child cannot read, we should say so. Reading for meaning is politicised speak. Pupils cannot read for meaning sounds better than Pupils cannot read. Yes, the latter sounds terrible. But at least the reality of it cannot be denied.